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Topic: Did you start your steel guitar studies on a lap steel? |
Ray Montee
From:
Portland, Oregon (deceased)
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Posted 4 May 2013 11:05 am |
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Just curious as to how many of you actually began your studies of the steel guitar on a lap steel; be it a flat top round hole guitar with NUT; or any other kind of steel guitar imaginable.
How many of you credit the Oahu Music Co., with being a prime source for your musical studies?
How many took the GIBSON guitar courses? |
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Jack Aldrich
From:
Washington, USA
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Posted 4 May 2013 12:20 pm
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In 1975, I started with a Dobro, on advice from Mayne Smith, to see if y ear was good enough. It was. 6 months later I got a Fender Champ 6 string lap steel to play a gig with Patsy Montana. Shortly after that it was on to pedals. I rented a S10 3/2 Emmons, which proved inadequate for gigging. In 1976 I went to see Red Rhodes, who sold me a wood neck 3/4 ShoBud S10, which I played professionally for 10 years. I had an 8 string Dobro through all that, which I played for family gatherings and old country jams. I got into lap steel in 2000 when I got bit by he Hawaiian music bug. Maybe 2 or 3 times a year I get a pedal steel gig. I'm on Oahu until tomorrow, where I've been gigging, sitting in, and attending conventions. I just bought a D8 Canopus from Greg Sardinha. I'll be playing steel with him this evening. - Jack
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Jack Aldrich
Carter & ShoBud D10's
D8 & T8 Stringmaster
Rickenbacher B6
3 Resonator guitars
Asher Alan Akaka Special SN 6
Canopus D8 |
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George Rout
From:
St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada
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Posted 4 May 2013 4:42 pm
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I started on a Stella in A Major Low Bass tuning in 1948 in Halifax. In 1950. I bought a steel guitar/amplifier set for $35 from a pawn shop, the guitar was a Rickenbacker J6 and the amplifier a Gaylord 5 watt. I still have the Ricky.
In 1953, I bought a 1948 Gibson Console Grande and so on. I still have the CG.
Geo
_________________
http://georgerout.com
"I play in the A Major tuning. It's fun to learn and so easy to play. It's as old as the hills....like me" |
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Bill Creller
From:
Saginaw, Michigan, USA (deceased)
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Posted 4 May 2013 5:42 pm
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The guitar I started with as a teenager was an old cheap flat top with Hawaiian silhouettes on it. And a few nice cracks on the back 
My first "electric" was a new Gibson BR-9 with the matching amp. I worked for a farmer for two summers to pay for it 
I had a few lessons, like about 6 months worth, with the Gibson System of notation. Never did use the "number" system that Oahu places taught. Haven't ever used the tab either.....( I'm too old & dumb to learn to use it now |
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Mike Spaeth
From:
Springdale, Arkansas
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Posted 4 May 2013 6:55 pm Re
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| Yes, on a 6-string lap steel using the Oahu lessons in 1969. |
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Billy Tonnesen
From:
R.I.P., Buena Park, California
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Posted 4 May 2013 7:09 pm
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Started taking lessons with the NIOMA Music School, for the rirst year on an accoustic six string guitar with a raised Nut which sat on your lap. After the first year they put me into a 6-string electric lap Steel with a small 6" speaker. That's when I really became interested in playing the Steel Guitar !
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Sacramento Western Swing Society Hall of Fame, 1992 |
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Robert Allen
From:
Tennessee, USA
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Posted 4 May 2013 7:18 pm
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| Yes, started taking lessons in 1945, Oahu Method high bass A tuning then after 5 years switched to another teacher who taught E7th from a different book. Played a Gibson pedal steel around 1960, very poor changer, then traded it for a Fender pedal which was a vast improvement over the Gibson, but having taken 10 years of lessons on the lap steel and being able to play what I wanted I saw no reason to continue playing a pedal steel that weighed a ton and took 30 minutes to setup. I sold the pedal steel in 1962 and have played dobro and lap steel ever since. I'm 73 years old and still learning new tricks on the lap. Occasionally a customer will bring a pedal steel into the shop for repair and I'll play a few songs on it but I don't have any intention of buying one. The lap steel is where it's at. |
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Steven Pearce
From:
Port Orchard Washington, USA
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Scott Duckworth
From:
Etowah, TN Western Foothills of the Smokies
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Posted 4 May 2013 8:03 pm
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Kinda, sortof...
Sho-Bud Maverick 30 years ago, was just good enough I sounded terrible and sold it for a bass.
Ahead 30 years, numbness in little and ring fingers of left hand made me try steel again, bought a Rogue RLS-1, loved it, now own a Marlen D-10W that I am learning on. This time, I AM gong to play this thing and do it well!!!
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Amateur Radio Operator NA4IT (Extra)
http://www.qsl.net/na4it
I may, in fact, be nuts. However, I am screwed onto the right bolt... Jesus! |
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Chris Templeton
From:
The Green Mountain State
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Posted 5 May 2013 3:26 am
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I was into cello, bass and guitar in the late 60's and my dad loaned me the money to by a Vega lap steel with a matching amp, at a pawn shop, in the early '70's.
My first pedal was a Marlen student model that was pretty beat up, which I bought several years later.
Thanks to Scotty, Tom Bradshaw, Jeff Newman, Maurice Anderson, Buddy Emmons, Guitar Player Magazine, and some great records, there was a lot of information about the steel.
I was also fortunate to have run across a steel guitar record collection that somebody had sold to a used record store in Boston.
I also feel lucky to have started playing steel when there was lots of live music in the clubs and bands that would allow you to sit in.
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Excel 3/4 Pedal With An 8 String Hawaiian Neck, Sierra Tapper (10 string with a raised fretboard to fret with fingers), Single neck Fessenden 3/5
"The Tapper" : https://christophertempleton.bandcamp.com/album/the-tapper
Soundcloud Playlist: https://soundcloud.com/bluespruce8: |
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Jack Stoner
From:
Kansas City, MO
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Posted 5 May 2013 6:57 am
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Mine started when I was about 12 or 13 with a used Ohau D-6 steel. Little Roy Wiggins was my inspiration to play steel and I bought every Eddy Arnold record (to age me, I started out with 78 RPM Eddy Arnold records) so I could hear what Roy was doing.
I went in the Air Force in 1955 and gave up steel, and went to 6 string guitar and bass. I bought a pedal steel (a Fender 2000) in October 1969 and that got me back into steel, although pedal steel.
In 1972/73 I was fortunate that I got to work for Little Roy Wiggins at his Nashville, lower Broadway, "Music City" music store. As we did a lot of weekend shows in the store with the Opry guests in town, I was Little Roy's rhythm guitar player on the shows. |
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Tony Lombardo
From:
Alabama, USA
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Posted 5 May 2013 9:23 am
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I've never had any interest in any version of steel guitar other than lap steel. I love the way they look, and I love the way one feels in my lap. First and foremost, I love their sound.
I remember the first time I heard one. I was 16 and taking 5-string banjo lessons from a local jazz guitarist. There were three lap steels leaning against the wall in his studio. I asked him what they were and how they were tuned. He told me that each was tuned differently and that one could tune one a hundred different ways. He challenged me to pick one of the three lap steels, pick a tune, and pick a key. I picked "It Had to Be You" in A on the yellow one. He picked it up and played a beautiful version of that tune (in A) on that little yellow lap steel. From then on I was hooked, but I didn't actually try to play a lap steel until I was in my late 40s.
I have no Interest in dobros or console steels or pedal steels or any other types of slide instruments. I want to play something pretty on lap steel like my teacher did all those years ago.
Tony L. |
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Danny James
From:
Summerfield Florida USA
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Posted 5 May 2013 9:10 pm
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I started at age 10 in 1948 at Harlin Bros. hawaiian guitar studio in Indianapolis. They used the Oahu method. My first guitar was a loaner 6 string acoustic Oahu from Harlins. Shortly after I went to an electric 6 string laptop. Then shortly after that I graduated to a Harlin Bros. 6 string 4 pedal all aluminum Multi-Kord, which I still have.
I have owned several Multi-Kords over the years since then.
My last Multi-Kord I still have, I modified by replacing the cables to the pedals with 3/16 stainless steel rods. I also made cross bracing for the legs on the pedal end of the guitar to take some of the wobble, and cabinet drop out of it. I no longer play it for medical reasons, but did up until about 4 yrs. ago. |
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Nate Hofer
From:
Overland Park, Kansas
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Posted 6 May 2013 4:18 am
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Not me. I started in earnest on a pedal steel E9. Played it for years and still do occasionally. But at the rate I'm going now I'll be counting lap steel as my primary instrument before long.
Count me as a convert I guess. |
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Rockne Riddlebarger
From:
Cincinnati, Ohio, USA
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Dom Franco
From:
Beaverton, OR, 97007
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Don McGregor
From:
Memphis, Tennessee
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Posted 6 May 2013 6:41 am
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Playing in country and country rock bands in early 70's Memphis, I was playing a 1937 Gibson ES-150 with heavy gauge strings, and for certain tunes, I would play it lap style. I had no teachers, no one to learn from, and I mostly just left it in regular Spanish guitar tuning. I was playing through an Ampeg B-12, and the combination of the CC pickup and this amplifier produced a tone that I wish I could reproduce. Sadly, I let the ES-150 go years ago, and the amp as well.
I left off my steel attempts some time in the 70's, and didn't take it up again until just a few years ago, when I bought a beat up Guyatone 6 string. Taking it more seriously this time, and with a wealth of teaching material available through the internet, I quickly moved to a Carvin Double 8, and then a National D8. I'm now building my own steels, and intend to build a 10 string in the near future. I still learn something new on steel every day. These instruments just keep on giving. |
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b0b
From:
Cloverdale, CA, USA
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Posted 6 May 2013 7:15 am
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I started on a Rickenbacker Electro (red, mid-60s model). No instructions, so I devised my own tuning A C# E G# B E. I made a fretboard map and taught myself the scales and slant positions from that.
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-š¯•“š¯•†š¯•“- (admin) - Robert P. Lee - Recordings - Breathe - D6th - Video |
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Tony Glassman
From:
The Great Northwest
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Posted 6 May 2013 11:39 am
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| Started on an Epiphone Electar Zephyr 7-string lap steel for about year, using C6th tuning. I was fortunate enough to meet Lucky Oceans who gave me some lessons, and then traded me his S-10 Sho-Bud (Baldwn era) for a 65 Dodge Dart rag-top and some cash. |
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Mark Eaton
From:
Sonoma County in The Great State Of Northern California
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Posted 6 May 2013 12:08 pm
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I took around three and a half years of lap steel lessons starting about age 9 1/2 in 1964 until I was 13. This studio in the Bay Area wasn't affiliated with Oahu, but I'm pretty sure some of the principles were the same. They gave us some cheap Hawaiian acoustics for the first four or five weeks to see if we'd stay interested - could have been Kay, Stella, whatever - then they sold my parents my first steel which I still have, a Supro Comet with a Supro tube amp, wish I still had the amp.
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Mark |
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Bob Hickish
From:
Port Ludlow, Washington, USA, R.I.P.
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Posted 7 May 2013 7:20 am
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To answer your question Ray -- all the above , except for the GIBSON guitar courses -- didnā€™t hear of that back then --
I didnā€™t even know what a steel was but liked the way it sound -- just a kid looking for something to do, & that looked like it could be fun.
I think WWII had something to do with Steel Guitar becoming popular. - and Harry Owens on the radio, that kind of influence |
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Bill Creller
From:
Saginaw, Michigan, USA (deceased)
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Posted 7 May 2013 6:30 pm
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Those Gibson courses had pictures from the 30s in them, even into the 50s. They didn't seem to up-date anything, except maybe the prices !!
Good course though. |
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Les Anderson
From:
The Great White North
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Posted 7 May 2013 11:20 pm
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I started with an acoustic guitar tuned to a six string E11th and played it with a piece of round stock steel. Next I had an old Hawaiian six string given to me as a debt pay off. Learned to play the little Hawaiian steel then dropped playing steel all together for many years. Got back into it playing a Guya D8 then bought and old Remington D10.
I went through the Cindy Cashdollar CD to learn western swing then like most other steelers, just started testing all of the various tunings.
I still can't figure out how a one would differentiate lap steel compared to a three or four legged console. Take off these legs and you have a lap steel. |
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C. E. Jackson
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Posted 9 May 2013 2:33 pm First Lap Steel
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| First lap steel was a 1949 Silvertone from Sears and cost $29.00. Guitar included a Sears Home Study Course for Electric Hawaiian Guitar consisting of 40 complete lessons. However, my father had taken lessons as a teenager, and was my main teacher. Still have and play the old Silvertone occasionally. I tuned and played in A tuning: A C# E A C# E. |
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Jim Bates
From:
Alvin, Texas, USA
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Posted 9 May 2013 4:15 pm
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First 'steel' guitar was an old 'Gene Autry' type, like a Stella, but had been refinished to remove the writing and picture on it. My dad put an extension nut on it and gave me an old pocket knife with hard plastic handle inserts to use as a bar. He tuned it to some chord and taught me the basics of: open chord, 5th fret chord, and the 7th fret chord. He died shortly after that of a heart attack when I was 11. With some of the money I got from Social Security, about 8 months later, I bought a Gibson lap steel with matching amplifier. A few weeks later saw an ad in Country Song Roundup for the Jerry Byrd steel guitar course $20, which I got and learned everything I could, as fast as I could. This was in mid-1953.
By erly 1954, I got my Fender T-3 Deluxe model and used my knowledge from Jerry's course to put A, E7, and C6/7 tuning on it. Later developed into A6th , E13th, and C6th. I got my first pedal steel (Sho-Bud X-over) in mid '69, and put on a pedal version of E13th and A6th (later C6th) which I still use today.
The first long lasting lesson I learned from Jerry Byrd was to "do not become just a copy cat, but develop your own style". Which I took to heart.
Thanx,
Jim |
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